


Dying is the Easy Part of Living

by sheep



Category: Avengers (Comic), Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-08
Updated: 2012-02-08
Packaged: 2017-10-30 19:47:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/335415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheep/pseuds/sheep
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been ten years since Clint's seen his brother, and the family reunion is not the one he was expecting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dying is the Easy Part of Living

**Author's Note:**

> I fused the multiple comic verses with the movie verse. There are only two things you need to know about it.
> 
> 1\. I played around with the ages and timeline.  
> 2\. Barney was considered dead at the end of a FBI undercover operation that went bad. He was revived and kept in a coma until discovered by Nemo who manipulated him to the darkside. 
> 
> Written for CC Bingo prompts 6&8: crying and sharing a bed.

_Dearest Baby Brother,_

_Ten years and I see you've managed to not just trick SHIELD but the Avengers as well. I think we both know the truth though. I think we both know what kind of person you'll always be. From beginning to end._

_P.S. I found your old mentor, he sends his best – me._

 

**

 

The wind is screaming around them, loud and piercing, washing out the sounds of the battle a few blocks away. They are already two men down with Banner in Europe and Thor on Asgard and they're probably about to be a third down as well. All Clint can hear is the wind and his own blood pounding in his ear, breath ragged, body tense. The only thought going through his head as he sinks to his knees on the roof of some New York highrise is how too goddamn tight his suit is. He can't breath but his eyes are fixed on the face behind the arrow pointed directly between his eyes. His own bow lays slack in his hands.

 

“I don't want to Barney.” Clint says, voice surprisingly even despite everything. He locks his eyes onto his brother's hard face all jagged lines and sharp features. Barney has always looked hardened though, even when they were young. Trickshot's mask is pushed up, making Barney's hair stick out in random clumps. He looks as ridiculous as he does terrifying.

 

“Of course you fucking don't.” Barney snarls.

 

“Just put it down. I won't tell a soul. We can just walk away.” Clint offers, sincere and earnest. Clint expects more monologuing, more talking, more blame. It's been ten years. He doesn't expect the bow to shift down and to the right. He doesn't expect the arrow in his shoulder, inches above his heart. The bow's military-grade, the shot close-range, and the pain explodes through his whole shoulder, he can feel where the arrow has gone through front and back.

 

It's agony, his actual heart's beating wildly as it's metaphorically breaking. Only an inch of the arrow before the fletching is left sticking out of his chest. There must be a solid six inches sticking out his back. His body lurches forward and he can't even hear the wind. He forces himself to lurch backwards so he's upright, knees spreading so his body can slump downward instead.

 

Clint looks up, eyes stinging with tears that blur his vision, in time to see Barney pull back a second arrow. The Avengers will find him soon enough, even though he tossed his communicator/tracker two blocks back - Coulson's going to kill him for that. It's fucked up that he hopes they don't hurt Barney more than he hopes to be alive by then. Barney took a lot of hits for him and one day, Clint was hoping to repay the favour. He just never considered it would be Barney who'd be the one collecting.

 

The second arrow hits his left thigh, it doesn't go all the way through. The third, in quick succession, hits his right and does. He doesn't scream but the sound he lets out sounds closer to a wounded animal than a man. He's heard that sound before at the Circus when one of the lions went lame during an act. The arrow tip on the right, grazes his calf. It hasn't broken the fabric of Clint's pants but he can feel its pressure, shifting side to side as his body decides which way to collapse. Clint has enough presence of of mind to fall to his right side, weak arm catching himself awkwardly, and he can't stop the slow slump backward onto his right shoulder, left in the air, shins still on the ground, thighs and back arched in the air. It's a stress position and it hurts but Clint can't move out of it. Each breath comes ragged finished with a whimper, his legs are on fire. The pain is searing hot and it's running up his spine.

 

The forth arrow pins his right hand to the roof, dead centre of his palm. The fifth grazes his cheeks, nicks a part of the cartilage of his ear before embedding into the roof. Clint looks at it for a long moment before lolling his head to the other side. All he can see is the sky, so goddamn blue, and it stretches forever. It's a beautiful final thing to see before dying; Phil probably can't see it at HQ. The sixth arrow never comes and neither does death.

 

Clint doesn't know how long he lies there, gasping like a landed fish, before he sees Iron Man, above him. He can feel the suit landing on the roof, vibrations through the arrow in his hand. He can't hear what Tony is shouting; he can't make out a word of it until Tony's face is right in front of his, taking up his entire world view.

 

“Clint, say something. Shit, who did this?” Tony is frantic, hands unsure at his side. Clint starts laughing, weak puffs of air, even though it hurts, making the arrow in his chest shift and jar. Clint always thought Tony would have a good one-liner for any occasion, even one like this. “Clint, medics are minutes out. Where is he? Who? Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Tony mutters and Clint doesn't get what was so funny in the first place.

 

“A ghost.” He mumbles because they'll figure it out soon enough but it won't be Clint who rats out Barney. Not this time, not ever.

 

“Where the fuck is medical?” Tony shouts and Clint's done for now. “Hey, don't die, don't you fucking die on me Hawkeye.” Stark is fucking slapping him and it hurts even though it shouldn't because Clint's a fucking porcupine at this point.

 

“I'm not fucking dying. I'm passing out.” Clint mutters, bitterly.

 

**

Clint wakes up when they pull his hand up along the arrow shaft enough to cut the bottom of it. He's screaming now, for the first time. Mostly expletives. All that pain that was just a dull constant throb is now a blade slicing its way through his entire body. His body jerks into it and away, sending a fresh wave searing in a different direction than the last. There are hands holding him down and the adrenaline is kicking in, he is awake and angry. Then the hands are levering him up and to the left.

 

He's shouting fuck in all its possible incarnations, delirious to anything but the set of hands he sees at his shoulder as they cut the arrow down. He can feel the way the arrow wobbles, sharp with the initial cut and then the smaller aftershocks, all throughout his chest, as they cut down the back and then the front. His mind's foggy again though but his world is pain. He can't even see the sky beyond the uniform of the medic in front of him and when they do the same to the arrow in his right thigh, he finally passes out.

 

**

 

Medical is white, too bright, noisy, and smells like lemon, artificial lemon. There are no windows and he has no idea what time it is. Clint closes his eyes, trying to remember. It only takes him a foggy second for it all to rush back, his shoulder bleats out a small thrum of pain. He closes his eyes and quells the hole in his chest that seems to be growing by the second. He hasn't seen his brother in a decade, and it was far from the reunion he was hoping for.

 

“Hawkeye.” Tony's voice is hesitant and also not the voice he was expecting. He was expecting Phil to be there. The disappointment is sharp. Clint lolls his head to the left, swallows, and cracks an eye before blinking them both open. He's on good drugs because nothing hurts, not even when he lifts his right hand up and rubs it along his face, bandages scraping against his stubble. He forgot about that wound. He knows he's grinning like a loon and Stark probably thinks Clint's fond of him now.

 

“Iron Man.” Clint answers, mentally cringing at the rasp in his voice. There is a cup with a purple straw sticking out of it brought to his lips and it feels like an indignity to drink from it but the water is too tempting to pass up. “No offence, but you weren't the welcome party I was expecting.” Clint says after he finishes drinking.

 

“I was considering dressing up like our Ms. Romanov but I didn't quite have the build for the suit.” Tony says, clever wit back in place. It's a welcome return.

 

“I don't know, a little tucking, a little stuffing, a good shave, a wig, and a pound of makeup should do wonders.” Clint jokes and the smile it gets out of Tony lasts for only a moment before his face grows serious again.

 

“SHIELD's working on tracking down whoever did this. The whole welcome party you were expecting too. You've been out for 12 hours. I have a different theory though. You were holding your bow, half-full quiver. The assailant was close and you were looking at them. I think you know who it was and it was someone _you_ wouldn't shoot, which narrows down the suspect pool.” Tony's looking at him, and the message is clear. Tony'll do it for him.

 

“Masked men are masked for a reason. Masked children too.” Clint says evenly, jutting out his jaw. Tony doesn't buy the lie, Clint can see it on his face.

 

“Doesn't always do the trick.” Tony counters and Clint can't help the flinch because it's too close, even if it was just a word choice for Tony. Clint, winces again and shifts, trying to pass it off as pain and not the giveaway it actually was. He can't tell if Stark buys it. He only knows that when he pretends to sleep, Stark gets up and leaves only minutes later.

 

**

 

Phil's there when Clint wakes up again, looking pensive. He's in a new suit, so it might be morning. Clint can't tell whether the base of the brood is anger or sadness, but it's probably a complex emotion that manages to be both and neither.

 

“Hey,” Clint murmurs, inching his hand out toward Phil, ignoring the twinge it causes in his shoulder. Phil startles a bit, hand already reaching out for Clint's on instinct. It makes Clint smile. Phil doesn't smile back though, his grip is hard even as his thumb soothes over the skin around the IV. The look in his eyes speaks more of fear than sadness or anger. It shakes Clint, a jolt of phantom pain where the arrow went through his shoulder. His grip tightens in response.

 

“Did you know he was still alive?” Phil asks and Clint can feel himself deflate a bit at the words.

 

“Yes.” Clint admits, eyes looking away to the door. “Don't... don't let them hurt him.” Clint manages and he can feel the ball in his throat, the one he always gets before he starts to cry. Bad enough he's stuck here without losing that dignity too.

 

Phil's there though, sitting on the edge of the bed. Clint curls into him, pressing his face against Phil's side, eyes stinging as he gulps, swallows a sob. He's grateful for whatever drugs they've given him because his legs and shoulder are only a dull ache, despite the pressure he's putting on them.

 

Phil rubs a hand roughly over Clint's hair and doesn't say anything in the minute it takes for Clint to get it out before he doesn't feel like crying. He feels like he's done crying for life.

 

“I shot him once you know? It's what made me finally turn to the good guys. I sat with him the whole time, our matching arrow wounds. Mine was from the original Trickshot but at the time, I'd much rather it'd been Barney that shot me.” Clint admits, not looking up at Phil's face. “He got me back, one for every couple of years he had to wait. I guess the fifth one doesn't count. Fuck. He was the same fucking way as a kid. He always had to win.” Clint says and it makes him laugh even though it's not funny in the slightest. “Family.” Clint says, deciding it sums up the entire situation as neatly as possible. When he flicks his gaze back up to Phil's face, he can tell the Agent does not agree.

 

“I'll let the team know your preferences but I can't promise they'll listen. Stark's mask recorded some images of the initial scene. The others -” Phil stops himself, taking a breath before continuing, “I don't think your reasoning justifies what I saw on that screen.” Clint can imagine them watching it. It's like listening to those 911 calls they show on the news with the transcripts. It doesn't make Clint feel anything but tired.

 

“He took hits for me his whole life.” Clint starts to explain because Phil has to get this, has to understand this fundamental thing about him and Barney. “Barney got the worst of it. From our Dad, from the kids at the group home, even from the carnies in the beginning, throughout actually. They never took to him like they did to me. So I get it. I get why he hates me. I get why he wants to hurt me. I just thought we'd punch it out. Bar Brawl sort of thing. I never thought he'd take the bow to me.” Clint sighs, his whole body feeling heavy.

 

“He took a lot of hits for me though. Fuck.” Clint swears again. “Painkillers take it right out of me.” Clint presses his face back into Phil's hip, enjoys the warmth.

 

“I'll be back when you wake up again.” Phil promises against Clint's hair. The last thing Clint's aware of his Phil's fingers rubbing gently at the hair at Clint's nape, before he presses a kiss against Clint's forehead.

 

**

 

Phil is indeed there when Clint wakes up again, feeling more alert. They're weening him off painkillers, the throbbing ache that turns into lancing pain when he moves any area an arrow went in make that obvious. Clint's about to say something completely inappropriate when he notices Steve and Natasha, standing at the door. Phil's in the chair and he's not sidling any closer, even though Clint can tell he wants to.

 

“Well.” Clint leads as they shuffle in, and of course it's awkward. The silence stretches on until Clint sends Cap and Natasha his most ridiculous grin. “I couldn't let Thor hog the dysfunctional, villainous brother limelight, now could I? Granted, Loki tends to lean more on the side of felony amounts of property damage than Barney.” No one is smiling though, they're all as somber as Clint knows is appropriate.

 

Natasha comes up and presses a photo into Clint's hands. Barney, in civilian clothes, walking into a coffee shop, 7 blocks from HQ. Barney's laughing at something the guy behind him said, and he looks good, healthy in a way that Clint can appreciate after seeing him so close to death they called it as such. He can't stop the small smile that the picture elicits. The past decade (or two) hasn't been their best but Clint's first solid memory, one he can place a time and a date on, is of Barney grabbing his hand and pulling him up, wiping the dirt off his shirt and telling him it was okay.

 

“He looks good.” Clint says, “terrible choice in coffee though. I should tell him about that Polish place that's a few blocks down.”

 

“ _Clint_ ” Natasha warns instead, voice hard, eyes betraying her worry. 

 

“Tash, I get it but leave it. Leave him. He's running with a bad crew and SHIELD's going to imprison him sooner rather than later. He'll probably be caught before I'll even be cleared for duty. How many weeks did they say it was going to be?”

 

“A month. And that's when you can take your first physical. It'll probably be longer, since you can never sit still long enough to heal.” Phil tells him, his voice neutral but Clint can hear the edge to it. Clint knows it's not directed at him. Clint's feeling comfortable, almost content despite the news until he looks over at Steve. Steve's staring down at the picture, face cold.

 

“I'm arresting him.” Cap tells Clint, and there is no room for argument. 

 

“I don't want you to.” Clint mimics the tone, juts his jaw out for good measure since he can't cross his arms over his chest. 

 

“Any person who puts three arrows in an unarmed man. Doesn't matter if you had a weapon, you weren't going to use it. Unarmed, is a danger to society.” Cap's finger jabs at the picture before pointing at Clint.

 

“He'd only do it to me.” Clint fires back. 

 

“Feel free to stop me. Get up, run to the armoury, grab your trick arrows and fire one at me.” Cap challenges and Clint's sitting up, ignoring the machines and his body as he tries to rip the IV leads from his body. 

 

“That is enough.” Phil decisive and though he doesn't yell, his voice carries. Phil's left hand firmly pushes Clint back into the bed, mindful of the wound, while his right one stills Clint's hand where he's holding onto the leads. “Rogers, your visiting privileges are revoked. You are also sequestered to the base along with Stark. You may commiserate but if you even think about plotting,” Phil doesn't finish the threat. Leaves it out there. 

 

Steve looks a mixture of pissed off and apologetic. “It's good to see you up and alert, Hawkeye.” Rogers says softly, cool anger gone for a brief moment, before turning on his heel and leaving. Natasha perches on the bed, hands brushing Clint's hair from his forehead. Her soft words are Russian and reprimands. When she finally smiles at him it's beautiful and mostly happy. 

 

Then it's just Phil. “Thank you.” Clint says, his head resting against Phil's ribcage and it can't be a comfortable position but Phil doesn't seem intent on moving any time in the near future. He's crammed onto the bed, ass hanging off the side, leg's crossed so they both fit, upper body draped at an odd angle to accommodate Clint's injuries. 

 

“None of them are going after him now but if he gets in any official trouble with any SHIELD member again, you included, that ban is lifted and I can't promise anything. I won't.” 

 

Clint nods, “Fair enough.” Clint won't tell Phil about the letters he's been getting for months, the notes that promised death. Because Barney had his shot and he couldn't make it.

 

“And if you ever purposely misplace your comm unit again, I'm taking you off active duty until  I  decide that you'll never make that mistake again. Years of desk jockeying.” Phil's voice is authoritative and it shouldn't be as comforting as it is. “You can't do that to me again.” Phil says, quiet and it breaks Clint's heart that little bit more. 

 

“I'm sorry.” Clint presses as much of his body against Phil's as he can. “If it makes you feel better, I bet Stark's spending his time-out figuring out a way to permanently chip me.”

 

“Of course he is. I put in that requisition form in hours ago.” Phil deadpans back, at least Clint hopes so. Clint closes his eyes, the pull of sleep enticing and insistent. 

 

“Promise me.” Clint starts, wanting to get this out before he can no longer blame it on the drugs, “That even if we go south in the worst ways, you'll never do that. Please don't ever hate me enough to do that.” Clint is immediately embarrassed. Even as Phil starts to say never, in that shocked way that means his mind had never even gone there, Clint tries to recover. “But then again you aren't Trickshot. So please never take up that mantel. Every incarnation has kabob-ed me at least once.”

 

“Don't” Phil's voice comes down hard on the consonants, and Clint can feel the way Phil's body is tensing, the way it does when Phil's trying to restrain himself. “Don't say 'kabob-ed' ever again.” Phil says, tone measured, with little inflection. Phil shuffles down a bit further on the bed, takes Clint's left hand in his, gripping it once hard, before holding on to Clint's wrist instead. It's a completely unsubtle way to check Clint's pulse. 

 

“I don't think there is a single thing you could do that would make me hate you. Remember Belgrade?” Phil says and he sounds so sure that Clint can feel his body relaxing even further into the touch.

 

“You kissed me in Belgrade.” Clint murmurs, sleep and drugs winning, but he doesn't think he'll ever forget Belgrade.

 

“Despite what you did in Belgrade.” Phil leaves as a gentle reminder. That was a mission that went FUBAR two minutes in. Clint would usually argue the point that while he made some bad decisions, how the Serbian hit squad dealt with it was a whole other matter. Name calling shouldn't lead to rib cracking. Instead, Clint just huffs out a laugh and nuzzles his face back into Phil's side, enjoying the warmth and subtle Eau du Phil.

 

He falls asleep to the gentle rise and fall of Phil's chest. Two days later when he gets a new letter, the only threat it in made against Phil, Clint puts up no protest when Phil leaves, a determined look on his face with only the order of “Captured Alive” to the rest of the Avengers assembled around his bed.


End file.
